Immortal Game has pulled the plug on its NFT and play-to-earn systems after rampant cheating made the platform unplayable for legitimate users. The blockchain-based chess game announced the pivot last week through Discord, with developer "Luxo" confirming that crypto rewards created an environment where cheaters outnumbered honest players.
The changes went live Monday. Immortal Game no longer accepts its Checkmate token ($CMT), shut down its NFT marketplace, scrubbed crypto language from the website, and stopped awarding tournament prizes in digital currency. The platform runs on Immutable X, an Ethereum scaling network, but that infrastructure now supports a game trying to distance itself from the technology it was built around.
Immortal Game launched as a play-to-earn chess platform inspired by the famous 1851 match between Adolf Anderssen and Lionel Kieseritzky. Players collected NFT chess pieces with unique challenges that encouraged experimental strategies. The concept attracted $15.5 million in funding, including a $12 million round last year from blockchain investors like TCG Crypto and Kraken Ventures. That bet hasn't paid off. The $CMT token crashed 73% this year, with most of the damage happening in recent months. Price data shows the token bleeding value as the platform struggled with its cheating problem.
Players used to earn $CMT by winning matches. That system, combined with zero entry barriers, turned the platform into a magnet for cheaters using engines and bots to farm rewards. Luxo explained that the team added crypto elements to reward the community but didn't anticipate how quickly financial incentives would corrupt the player base. "We cannot stand by and let this cheating happen any longer," Luxo stated. "While we'll still explore Web3 and decentralized technologies for anti-cheat measures and community engagement, our primary focus is to advance our chess platform, ensuring a fair and enjoyable environment for all players."
The NFT chess pieces still work in "Immortal mode," but their utility outside that single game mode is gone. Immortal Game joins a growing list of projects backing away from blockchain after initial commitments. Nearly 50 blockchain games shut down development this year, and other titles have launched crypto-free versions to get onto Steam, which bans NFT integration. Neopets and Gran Saga: Unlimited made similar moves recently, abandoning blockchain plans after raising money on the promise of web3 features. Cheating exists everywhere in competitive gaming, but tying real money to match outcomes accelerates the problem. Immortal Game tried to build a chess platform with blockchain rewards and discovered that the economics of cheating made the game unplayable.
